


Five times Daryl wanted to kiss Carol and one time he did

by leigh57



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-12
Updated: 2015-02-12
Packaged: 2018-03-12 13:37:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3337205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leigh57/pseuds/leigh57
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Well, the title pretty much covers the summary;-)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five times Daryl wanted to kiss Carol and one time he did

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually an ask response to a wonderful prompt from memoriesinatrunk on tumblr. Standard warning for gratuitous smushiness/fluff. And huge thanks to adrenalin211 for the encouragement and input:) You are the best, for serious.

**1.**

The leaves make a slick slippery noise under his boots as he paces the perimeter of the makeshift camp they’ve set up for the night. A misty drizzle blankets everything, relentless chilling rain that soaks into your bones and settles there, icy and permanent.

It feels right though.

Fitting.

Readjusting the crossbow that’s jamming uncomfortably into his shoulder, he glances toward what’s left of the fire, pathetic-looking embers that hiss and pop with each drop of rain.

Carol’s visibly trembling as Michonne gently helps her into a warmer coat. She winces and sucks in air when Michonne lifts her right arm, and Daryl balls his hand into a fist so tight the muscles ache in protest.

He squeezes harder, intensifying the pain, unsure what the fuck else he’s supposed to do with his body right now.

He almost wishes fifty walkers would stumble out of the trees, just so he could mow the fuckers down one by one, so he could have an excuse to beat the shit out of something.

Watching Carol’s shoulders shake — her lips tinted blue with the cold — he’s hit with another uncontrollable wave of rage-filled helplessness.

He couldn’t save Beth.

He couldn’t save Carol.

And even though some miracle kept her alive, he can’t even fucking keep her warm.

Grabbing some more kindling from beneath the tarp Glenn tossed over it, he throws the sticks on the fire and jabs it with the bolt he’s been fiddling with ever since he took watch.

Michonne’s saying something to Carol; he can hear the soft rise and fall of their voices but he’s not close enough to make out the words.

A second later Carol tilts her head sideways and a touch back, pulling her shirt away from her right shoulder. Michonne squeezes something out of a tube and rubs it over Carol’s collarbone, then up to her neck. The flash of pain that dances across Carol’s face is gone in a split second.

But he sees it.

In the strange hanging seconds between the moment the van tipped over the bridge and the moment it smashed into the ground so hard Daryl was pretty sure at least a third of the bones in his body were broken, he’d held two thoughts in his mind, intertwined.

If she died because of him, he’d never forgive himself. (He honestly has no concrete opinion on the subject of god, but he’s certain the begging chant in his mind was something close to praying.)

And if he died, there were worse ways to go than an instant lights out with his last picture her face and his last sensation her fingers holding warm onto his.

Now, he stares at the huge, purple-red bruise on Carol’s chest and shoulder.

Maybe his instinctive plea to whatever was out there worked.

He doesn’t fucking know.

He wants to put his lips there. He wants to feel how soft her skin is, how warm, how alive. In fact, right now all he wants is to bury his face right there, to go to sleep with his mouth pressed against her neck at the exact place where he knows he’d be able to feel her pulse on his lips.

In this moment, if he could do that, he’d be fine with never waking up again.

**2.**

"Will you just hold still for a minute?" She dabs at the cut on his arm with a piece of an ancient cotton t-shirt.

"It’s nothin’," he mutters, fidgeting on the stump he’s currently using as a seat.

"I never said it was fatal." She rolls her eyes and presses the soft cloth against the cut again. It’s still oozing decently. "But let me put some alcohol on it and cover it up."

"Y’don’t have to-"

"I know I don’t have to." She pauses, watching his eyes, and something shifts in her expression, transforms from amusement to … he doesn’t even know the word for it.

What he does know is that it makes him uncomfortable, that he’s suddenly hyper-aware of how close she is, that her hands still smell faintly like the strawberries she cut up that morning to put in everyone’s oatmeal, that he can hear her breathing.

That her eyes are his favorite shade of blue.

(Later, he’ll think about it again and realize that he never had a favorite shade of blue until she was there.)

He drops his gaze to avoid the blush he knows is coming if he keeps looking right at her, but his eyes land on her lips, and it doesn’t take a second for him to realize what a poor choice that was.

They’re tinted red from the strawberries, and she’s put Vaseline or something on them because it’s cold and everyone’s skin is constantly chapped.

He wonders how it would feel to touch them with his thumbs.

He wonders how it would feel to touch them with his tongue.

He wonders if he’s actually lost his mind to be thinking this shit.

"I’ll go see if Sasha has any bandages left," she says, and he can’t decide if he’s inventing the slight strain he now detects in her voice. "Keep pressing on it." She pushes the cloth into his hands.

"Still think you should jus’ leave it," he mutters, but he does exactly as she told him to.

She walks away, smirking at him over her shoulder. “Good thing no one asked you.”

**3.**

She’s changing Judith’s diaper, keeping up one of those endless running monologues that seem to come naturally to people who know what they’re doing around babies. Carol doesn’t baby talk Judith though, none of that ludicrous high-pitched babbling bullshit.

She just talks to the baby like a small person — describes the weather, tells her a story about something ridiculous Carl did, fills her in on plans for the day, teasingly reprimands her for rejecting every form of squash they’ve tried to feed her.

When she’s done, she blows a giant raspberry in the middle of Asskicker’s stomach and the baby erupts into uncontrollable giggles, reaching for Carol’s face, patting her cheeks.

Carol kisses Judith’s nose, three times, and then picks the little girl up, holding her close. Judith curls into Carol’s body like it’s second nature, and one pudgy hand goes up to rub a soft strand of Carol’s hair. Carol leans toward Judith’s hand, probably to avoid having her hair yanked, and the sunlight catches the curve of the bone at the top of her spine.

With no warning, he’s imagining his mouth on that bone, tongue tracing a circle.

He wonders if she’d like it. If she’d smile. If she’d make a noise. If she’d angle her neck to make it even easier to kiss her perfect skin.

Fuck.

He silently curses the half a hard-on he already has and walks quickly away, mumbling over his shoulder something about checking a trap.

**4.**

"Shit. I’m out." Glenn slams his cards on the ground so hard they scatter, a pair of tens and three useless number cards that make it clear why he’s folding.

I’ll see your twenty,” says Tara, her words slurring a little, “And raise you ten.” She throws in one of the pennies they’re using as chips, with a dramatic flick of her wrist as punctuation.

They’re playing what he’s relatively sure is the weirdest version of strip poker he’s ever heard of. Rather than actually taking off any clothes, you draw a stick figure in costume, and each time you lose, you have to draw it again, subtracting one piece of clothing. ( _It was fun in middle school!_ , Tara had exclaimed when they all looked at her like she was crazy for even suggesting it.)

Daryl stares at his shitty drawing, the lines blurring as he squints. His pathetic stick dude is down to a pair of boxers, socks, and boots. His cards suck, mostly different suites and not a face card among them. “I’m out, too,” he mutters.

"You gotta drink then, jackass," Glenn announces cheerfully, as he tosses back his own shot of some seriously cheap shit whiskey. His horrified face as he swallows almost makes this dumbass game worth it.

Daryl tips the paper cup back and drinks the whiskey down in one giant gulp, and it’s only moments before the stinging warmth washes out from his stomach to his chest and up toward his cheeks. He briefly wonders whether the lining of his digestive system is dissolving, right now, but he feels too good to care.

He still can’t figure it, but on today’s run they found a liquor store that hadn’t yet been cleared out, and after the last few weeks, nobody’s exactly turning down the chance to get shitfaced and forget for a minute. Rick and Michonne offered to be the night’s designated drivers; every now and then Daryl can hear their mocking laughter as the group around the small fire gets slowly more wasted.

Truth is, he can’t believe how much his head’s spinning after only three shots. He can hear Merle’s laughter, his brother’s voice telling him what a fuckin’ pussy he’s turned into. He clears his throat and glances toward Carol.

She’s sitting next to him, huddled into her coat and studying her cards as if glaring at them for long enough might make them change. Finally she shrugs and says, “Call.”

Everyone snaps their cards to the ground in front of them, and after a quick scan, Carol laughs. “Shit.”

"Yes!" Sasha makes a victorious bounce, and he can feel the edges of his mouth tilting up at the brief smile that brightens her face.

"Drink!" Tara tips her own cup back and reaches for the pencil by her leg so she can redraw her stick figure. "Well, I still have jeans and a bra. Not bad." She leans toward Carol’s drawing, squinting in the firelight. "How about you?"

"I have-" Carol bursts into a fit of laughter before she can finish the sentence. He tries not to think about how much he wants to distill that sound, put it in a bottle he can open up whenever he needs to hear her being … as close to happy as whatever the hell is left in this goddamn world lets her be. Carol drains her cup, makes a hilarious face as she swallows, then clears her throat and announces, "I have one sock." She holds up her drawing to demonstrate.

Glenn snorts. “Why didn’t you leave your underwear on?”

"Maybe my feet get cold easily!" she retorts, sticking out her tongue at him.

Daryl’s eyes scan the drawing before she sits it down next to her, but it’s not the hilarious mess of a stick figure with exaggerated eyelashes and one fucking sock on that’s taking over his brain. He’s thinking about her, sitting on the bed with her ankles crossed, wearing nothing but the kind of ridiculous fuzzy socks Tara has on right now.

Flicking his glance to the right, he sees the whiskey remnants shining on Carol’s lips.

He wants to smooth his tongue slowly over that shine, to know what the alcohol would taste like on her mouth.

Fuck, maybe Merle’s right. He scrubs his hand over his face and says, “We might wanna call it before nobody can get up tomorrow.”

"You’re just afraid of losing your boxers," Carol whispers, leaning unsteadily toward him.

"Says the woman who’s wearing a sock," he shoots back before he can stop himself.

She smirks, raising a challenging eyebrow, and even though he’s theoretically aware that the bright dancing sparks that light up her eyes are from the whiskey, she’s still mesmerizing.

So mesmerizing, in fact, that it takes both of them a second to notice the awkward silence that’s fallen over the campfire group while he and Carol have been staring at each other. He jumps up, too quickly, and stumbles sideways before he can balance himself (at least physically). He kicks the sole of Glenn’s boot. “Hey asshole. Gonna help me put the tents up, or are you too wasted?”

"I’m solid. Just let me-" Glenn manages to achieve a standing position in a three step process he couldn’t reproduce if he tried. "Okay. I’m upright. Let’s do this."

Daryl can’t resist one final glance at Carol. Her face is a warm pink, and she’s undone another couple buttons of her shirt (not that it really makes a difference when she has a tank underneath, but there’s something about the opening … ). She’s actually got the entire bottle of whiskey to her lips now, draining the final drops as she leans her head back to get the right angle.

She grins at him, turns even pinker, and then drops her eyes to the ground, fiddling with one of the buckles on her boot.

He’s a hundred percent sober by the time the tents are up, the fire’s down to embers, and they have the watch schedule worked out for the night. But he’s still flashing on the soft shade of pink on Carol’s cheeks and the fact that this time, she looked away first.

He always looks away first.

**5.**

He lays quiet in the early morning half-light, careful not to move any more than breathing requires. She’s still asleep, face smushed into the pillow, her left arm rising and falling on his chest.

He wasn’t dreaming.

The truth is that he’s only convinced last night really happened because his back hurts like a sonofabitch and there’s a clear hickey right above his left hip bone.

(Sure, there are the images — her body hot and arching under his hands, her tongue on his neck, her voice whispering words in his ear he’d never imagined even in his most creative fantasies — but dreams can be vivid, too.)

It’s the first time in his life he’s ever woken up with a naked woman in his bed and been happy about it.

Really happy.

In fact, he’s relieved Carol’s still sleeping and nobody can see him, because he’s positive that whatever expression he’s wearing makes him look like a fucking idiot.

She has to be exhausted (they couldn’t keep their hands off each other long enough to fall asleep until a couple hours ago), and all he wants is for her to sleep as long as possible, because he knows that about ten seconds after she wakes up, she’ll start feeling guilty about all the shit she should be doing to help. So he listens to the occasional chirp of the birds talking to each other outside the window, watches her breathe, and tries to absorb his own surprise at how much her arm resting warm and relaxed on his chest isn’t bothering him or making him want to bolt out of the room.

After ten or fifteen minutes, she blinks her eyes open, and he has to fight back a smile as he literally watches her process the fact that she’s here.

Naked.

In bed.

With him.

Her cheeks are heated pink, her hair crazy in all directions, and her blue eyes sleepy, but he’s not sure he could pinpoint a time when he’s ever found her more beautiful.

When her eyes finally flick to his, she gives him a tiny, shy smile and says, after a beat, “What?”

"Nothin’." He runs a finger along her hairline, smoothing the soft strands away from her face. "Maybe I just like lookin’ at you."

The pink in her face deepens, and his eyes drop to her lips — he can’t help it.

She’s magnetic.

He’s leaning in to kiss her before he fully realizes what he’s doing.

She sucks in a surprised breath. “Daryl, I haven’t even brushed-“

He interrupts her sentence with a kiss, the words _Like I give a fuck_ swirling somewhere in the back of his brain. Her lips are tense for a split second before he feels them curve into a smile, her body relaxing as she presses closer, forgets about toothpaste, and lets instinct take over.

**6.**

He snaps into consciousness to the sound of a door clicking shut and the instant conviction that something is attempting to crush his brain from the inside.

Everything feels too bright, like someone stuck one of those filters over his eyes — the kind Merle’s dickhead friends used to have on their phones.

He squints until the shape moving towards him turns into Carol, looking ashy and exhausted, carrying a tray with something on it that … actually smells really good. She deposits the tray on the small wooden table beside the bed and sits next to him, leaning to cover his forehead with her hand. After a beat, she exhales so loudly he can hear the air leaving her lungs and says, relief shaping every tired word, “Finally, you’re not burning up.”

He rubs at his eyes, trying to get all the input to make sense. “What’s goin’ on?”

"I think that’s my line," she says, and although her voice holds the familiar teasing lilt he loves, he’s not fooled for a second. Her eyes have deep purple circles under them and her expression radiates worry. "Last time I came in here, you were taking both sides of an argument." She pulls his hand into hers and squeezes, holding on. "I think you were talking to Merle."

Images and fragments slip and slide around in his mind as he tries to grab one long enough to make sense of it. After a second, he remembers. Offering her what he’s sure is a shitty attempt at a smile, he says, “It was Merle. Asshole wanted me to give him this sweet bike I’d just spent two months fixin’ up.”

"Is that what you were trying to yell about?" She picks up a bottle from the tray and taps three pills into her hand. Extending a glass of water, she says, "Can you take these?"

He nods and pushes himself up (which is a poor choice for his throbbing head, but he’s careful not to wince, since she already looks so upset), accepting the medicine and swallowing it down with large gulps of water. “Fuck, I’m thirsty,” he mutters, tipping the glass back to get the last drop.

"I bet you are." She scoots a little closer on the bed. "Your fever was so high I was sponge bathing you with cool water every few hours."

"And I don’t even remember?" He reaches for her hand again, tightening his fingers over hers. "Shit, that’s not fair."

"Stop," she says, and her voice cracks a touch. She wraps her other hand over the top of the one holding hers and presses the tips of his fingers to her cheek. "I was so scared."

Now that he’s more or less awake, bits and pieces come back to him. Cool cloth and her soft hands on his skin. Nervous voices.

_I have to bring it down._

_You need rest too, Carol._

_No, I’m not leaving._

_Carol._

_I said **No!**_

When he was maybe seven or eight, he came home from school so sick one afternoon that he collapsed in the hallway on the way to the bathroom. Fuck knows how much later it was when he woke up to the toe of his mom’s slipper jabbing him in the back and her overloud, angry voice yelling, _What’s the matter with you? Get the hell off the floor and clean up this mess._

Now he looks into the tired, worried blue of Carol’s eyes and wonders what one thing he had to have done perfectly right at some point to deserve the gift of her.

"I’m sorry I worried you," he says, his voice gravelly from the sore throat and lack of use. “‘Except for the headache, I don’t feel too bad now."

She drops his hand and reaches for his face, her thumb tracing gently over his cheekbone. “Good. Maybe you can eat the soup I brought you. Maggie says it’s delicious.”

He runs a finger over her wrist. “Lemme guess. You haven’t had any ‘cause you brought mine over here first.”

Realizing her mistake, she grins and shrugs. “I will later.”

"You better."

"I promise," she whispers, and leans forward to kiss him.

Even he’s surprised by how quickly his hand darts up and lands in the center of her chest, stopping her body’s movement. “Don’t.”

Her forehead scrunches. “You don’t want me to kiss you?”

"Yeah, I want you to kiss me." His mouth quirks up at her question. "But I want you well more. You don’t need to get this shit."

She rolls her eyes. “I’ve been taking care of you non-stop for the past two days. I’m willing to risk it.”

He shakes his head and lifts up her hand, kissing the tip of her index finger. “I’m not.”


End file.
